Israeli settler attacks displaced 107 Palestinian communities since 2023: HRW

Human Rights Watch said Thursday that escalating Israeli settler violence has fully or partially displaced 107 Palestinian communities across the occupied West Bank since the start of 2023, with attacks reaching a record daily rate this year. The organization cited United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs data documenting an average of 6.6 attacks per day in 2024 resulting in casualties, property damage or both — the highest rate in the UN agency's records.

Violence escalated sharply during March and April, the report found, involving killings — including of children — as well as assaults, sexual violence, arbitrary detention, arson, property destruction and theft. The rights group investigated attacks in April and May targeting seven Palestinian villages and towns in the governorates of Ramallah in the central West Bank, Nablus in the north and the Jordan Valley in the east, interviewing 20 witnesses and reviewing video evidence.

State complicity

Sarah Sanbar, acting Israel and Palestine researcher at Human Rights Watch, said the Israeli government and settlers share the objective of seizing land while removing Palestinian presence. "The Israeli government and the settlers share the same goal of maximum land and minimum Palestinians, with the authorities not only failing to stop settler violence, but actively enabling it," Sanbar said. She added: "Settlers shoot, attack, and expel Palestinians from their land, and the state provides the weapons, the legal cover, and the budget to do it."

The organization noted that settlers responsible for displacing Palestinians operate with financial, material and legal support from the Israeli state. The Times of Israel reported that the government approved approximately 50 million shekels (about $16 million) for illegal settlement outposts, funding used for all-terrain vehicles, night-vision goggles and drones deployed to harass Palestinian communities, according to HRW. The group also cited Amnesty International figures showing the Ministry of Settlement and National Missions' budget has increased 122 percent under the current government.

International response

At least 15 Palestinians, including two children, have been killed by settlers as of July 24, compared to 16 such killings in all of 2023, according to OCHA data cited by the rights organization. The escalation has been clear since the current government took office in December 2022, Human Rights Watch stated, adding that Israeli authorities are arming, funding and granting impunity to violent settlers responsible for deadly abuses.

In July 2024, the International Court of Justice concluded in an advisory opinion that Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories is unlawful and that it had systematically failed to prevent or punish settler attacks against Palestinians. The occupied West Bank has witnessed continued escalation in settler attacks and Israeli military operations since the start of Israel's genocide in Gaza on Oct. 8, 2023, alongside the expansion of settlement outposts, road construction and increased restrictions on Palestinian movement.